


who decides what's real — I only know what I feel (Hope/Fear)

by passeridae



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Dead Dove: Do Not Eat, Graphic Descriptions of a Bad Trip, M/M, Neon Noir AU, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Rape/Non-con Elements, Recreational Drug Use
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-14
Updated: 2019-10-14
Packaged: 2020-12-15 00:48:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21025013
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/passeridae/pseuds/passeridae
Summary: The throb of the bass is somehow even heavier on the dance floor, beating like a heart. It fills Jack’s ears, his lungs, moves him as it ebbs and flows. Jack hasn’t danced in years, not since— Well. Not in years. Someone comes up to him, young, bright, cybernetics glowing pale blue in the lights. He puts one hand on Jack’s chest, a clear suggestion. Jack lets him, drunk enough not to care. The boy leans close, bobbing on his tiptoes in order to look Jack in the eyes. Whatever he sees there makes him grin, delighted, and press his thumb to Jack’s lower lip.Ever so gently, he pushes his thumb inside Jack’s mouth. When he pulls back, a pill’s stuck on Jack’s tongue, chalky and dry. “Something to make you feel good tonight, baby,” the blue-limned boy purrs in Jack’s ear. Jack knows it’ll be an upper, probably mixed with something else. Possibly a hallucinogen, or something to magnify the drug’s effects — it’s hard to guess, the drugs in this city are so dirty. But he hurts, and he’s tired, and he wants to feel good, just for a little. He swallows.





	who decides what's real — I only know what I feel (Hope/Fear)

Once again, Jack’s chasing a lead on the Shimada clan. He’s been working on this case for weeks, both at work and out of it. Wheedling and threatening and bribing, slowly inching his way closer and closer to shipment times, to shipment contents, to getting a peek inside their operation. To having a chance at shutting them down. He needs to shut them down, before they can do any more damage.

His current lead’s brought him here, to a seedy nightclub off a dingy alleyway. It’s underground, so that the throb of the bass and the chatter of the clientele don’t reach too far, two doors between Jack and the exit. Normally, he’d consider only one exit to be too much of a risk to even consider coming here. But he _needs_ his next data point, needs that inch that’ll bring him closer. So he paid the entrance fee, exorbitant, considering, and made his way down into the dark and noise.

Except, the man he needs to meet isn’t here tonight. It’s not precisely unusual, based on the data he does have, but it’s frustrating. He’s cased the area twice, looping slowly as he moved with the music, fluid as water under the strobe. He’s been drinking (better to fit in, he tells himself, ignoring the part of him that screams every time a bottle isn’t in his hand), the bartender nodding and giving him doubles every time he asks for a refill. Or, maybe more than doubles, given how the world’s begun to blur at the edges, like frames are missing from his view, the way everything’s begun to become soft and hazy. He wants to dance, he decides, just for a while. His target isn’t here, and he’s already paid the cover charge. May as well enjoy it.

The throb of the bass is somehow even heavier on the dance floor, beating like a heart. It fills Jack’s ears, his lungs, moves him as it ebbs and flows. Jack hasn’t danced in years, not since— Well. Not in years. Someone comes up to him, young, bright, cybernetics glowing pale blue in the lights. He puts one hand on Jack’s chest, a clear suggestion. Jack lets him, drunk enough not to care. The boy leans close, bobbing on his tiptoes in order to look Jack in the eyes. Whatever he sees there makes him grin, delighted, and press his thumb to Jack’s lower lip.

Ever so gently, he pushes his thumb inside Jack’s mouth. When he pulls back, a pill’s stuck on Jack’s tongue, chalky and dry. “Something to make you feel good tonight, baby,” the blue-limned boy purrs in Jack’s ear. Jack knows it’ll be an upper, probably mixed with something else. Possibly a hallucinogen, or something to magnify the drug’s effects — it’s hard to guess, the drugs in this city are so dirty. But he hurts, and he’s tired, and he wants to feel good, just for a little. He swallows. 

The boy laughs, throws his arms around Jack’s neck, grinds against him as the music deepens. Whatever’s in the pill hits quick, Jack’s heartbeat speeding, muscles loosening. His mouth is dry, so he kisses the boy. It’s easy as breathing. Their mouths spill together, separating and coming together as the two of them move with the beat, lost in it. Jack’s world narrows down to the sensations he’s feeling, to this tiny microcosm of him, and the boy, and the music. When he blinks, geometric shapes tumble across his vision, tessellating endlessly in the riot of light and darkness and smoke that make up the inside of the club. It’s nauseating. His head is spinning, the faint light that there is hurts his eyes. He breaks away, shaking his head, and stumbles off the dance floor towards the bathrooms. The boy looks disappointed, but is soon distracted by someone else in the crowd.

The bathrooms are brightly lit, and the shock of light sends Jack stumbling to a stall where he throws up the contents of his stomach. It’s mostly alcohol, in all honesty, and Jack feels a little better with it out of his system. The world is still spinning, though, shapes and colours curling across his vision. He can’t tell if the bathroom tiles are patterned, or if it’s all in his mind, and whenever he moves bright bursts of colour blur across his vision. He can’t keep his head up straight, his hands are shaking. He stumbles over to the sinks, washes out his mouth and splashes his face with cold water. It doesn’t help. Fuck, he should leave. Get somewhere quieter, less populated. The music throbs through the walls, and it feels less like a heart and more like a war drum. Claustrophobic, closing in on him. The walls shake, rippling with the force of it. He looks up at his face in the mirror, and his pupils have eclipsed his irises. His eyes look black. He needs to go. 

Pushing the door open, he stumbles into a group coming into the bathroom, their laughs echoing in the empty space. Their faces don’t look human, not right somehow. Monstrous. One of them slaps him on the back, and Jack almost punches him, suddenly vibrating with tension. This isn’t right, none of this is right. He needs to go.

Outside the club is no better. The air is stagnant, heavy with smog and smoke and grime, and Jack can feel it curling heavy in his lungs. Neon signs flicker and writhe in the corners of his vision and he has to stop again in order to retch into the gutter. None of the streets look familiar, he knows this city, he does, but he may as well have never seen it before for all the good that knowledge does him now. There are shapes that look like people, but whenever he gets close they’re shown to be monstrous — ogres and demons and animals pantomiming humanity. It’s too loud. It’s too loud, and too bright, and his heart beats in his ears like it wants to escape. He — 

He slams a door behind him, and it is suddenly, blessedly dark.

Jack takes a moment to stand there, shaken, shaking, rattling right down to his bones. There are shapes in the darkness, wriggling shapes, but they’re faint and distant and so much better than being out in the light. He can taste metal on his tongue, can’t tell if he’s bitten something. There are voices coming from in front of him.

Voices? Surely that’s not right. This place looked abandoned, he thought, and even so, for there to be voices without light is strange. He starts to move in the dimness, away from the door and further into the building. The floor wavers under him, it’s a struggle not to fall. His footsteps echo. “Well, what do we have here?” something says behind him, as he’s grabbed by the arms. 

Suddenly there’s light again, and Jack’s nausea returns with a vengeance. He’s pushed to the floor, which is good because his knees were going to give out anyways. When he looks up, there’s an oni sitting in front of him, red horns, white face, black hair. Jack convulsively swallows. 

“Hello there little mouse,” the oni says, face in a rictus grin, “why were you sniffing around here so late?”

Jack blinks, tries to wet his lips to speak, finds his mouth dry. He swallows again. The oni quirks its head to the side, hopping down off the table it was perched on to grab one of Jack’s wrists. He hadn’t even realised that he’d been released by whoever manhandled him over here. His body feels like it’s someone else’s, like he’s puppeting it wrong. “Oh, little mouse, you’ve been at one of my clubs, haven’t you.” The oni is looking at the stamp on Jack’s wrist, the one from the club’s entrance. A sword and sparrow in smeared black ink. The oni looks delighted, running his finger over the stamp as it pushes itself closer into Jack’s personal space. He’s trapped, hemmed in, not able to move or flee or defend himself. Can’t even bring his arms up to push the oni away. “What do you think of the new batch of my drugs, hm,” the oni asks as it tilts Jack’s head up, “It’s killer, isn’t it.” There’s a mean little laugh as it takes in the state of Jack’s face. “You’re tripping balls.”

The world heaves under Jack’s knees as his head is moved, spinning and lurching. His diaphragm spasms and he chokes on air. “McCree, come over here,” the oni calls over Jack’s head, beckoning with one crooked finger. For a moment, the digit seems wreathed in flame. At the sound of heavy footsteps behind him, Jack tries to turn, but the oni’s hand, still on his jaw, grips him in place with nails like iron. 

“Yessir, I — Jack?” The voice behind him is rough, with a smokiness to it that rises like ash. It sounds shocked, but Jack can’t imagine why. Can’t imagine how it knows his name, even. 

The oni sounds sly when it speaks again. “Oh, you know this little mouse, do you? That makes things more fun.” The vice grip on his jaw is released, and Jack falls forwards at the sudden loss of stability. His fingers catch on the rough floor, bleeding as the skin’s sheared off. The oni isn’t there to break his fall, leaving him to tumble, gone in a whisp of smoke to talk to whoever or whatever’s behind him. Their voices are low, grating, the oni laughs like a threat and smacks the other being with the sound of meat hitting meat. “Go get him, boy.”

There are hands on him. He thinks he may lose time. 

The lights have moved, when he comes back to himself, above his face now, wavering and dancing on the ceiling. They have halos of bright incandescence that flicker in and out of existence as Jack blinks. His eyes feel like lead. His limbs are syrupy, moving them takes enormous effort. He thinks perhaps somebody gave him something, slipped something in his drink. No, wait, he hadn’t been drinking recently, had he? There had been the club, and the boy, and the pill, but after that… perhaps he was still at the club. There was enough noise for it, music with a heavy bass playing through the space. Hands touching him, gripping tight to his waist. He’s jolted, and the world wavers like an illusion. Again, then again. His gorge rises. There’s the sound of cruel laughter to his side, and he turns his head to see the oni crouched beside him. 

He startles, tries to scramble away, but the hands at his waist hold him down. “Shh, shh, calm down, that’s it, fuck,” muttered from near him, then, “Shit, I’m close, boss, please.” 

The oni pets one hand through Jack’s sweat-damp hair, clicks his tongue as if in thought. “He’s only just coming around, though, that’s no fun. I thought I told you to give me a good show.” It raises an eyebrow at the shape in the dark, which groans as if in agony. As it pulls out of him, Jack realises that he’s being fucked. He should feel something about that, he knows, fear or revulsion, but nothing comes. He just feels empty, cold. He whines, not liking the sensation, and the oni laughs once again. “See, I told you. It’s far more fun when he’s with us.”

The shape rolls him over, gently, supporting him as he sways, leaden on his knees, and pushes back into his body. Jack can feel it, this time, and groans at the strength of the sensation. He doesn’t know if it’s pleasure or pain, but whatever it is it’s powerful and burning and races through him like fire. It licks at his fingertips, and he looks at them in rapt fascination. He can’t see the fire, but he can feel it, curling round his bones. He curls his fingers, then straightens them, flinching as the rough fabric beneath him enhances the sensation until his fingertips tingle and burn. A body lies itself across his back, hot breaths panting over his neck and skittering down his spine. It growls obscenities into the salt on his back, shudders and shivers, and rocks him forwards with a fervour that makes his knees ache. Jack thinks he makes a noise, but he’s not quite sure. 

At some stage, something hot and viscous splatters over his back. It’s scalding, counterpoint to the cold emptiness that’s swallowing him up. The oni’s voice, again, echoing in the space, “clean up your mess, there’s a good boy.” Jack lets his knees give out, shaking with effort, falls sprawled on his belly. The shape follows him down, a hot mouth pressing down his spine, hands patting over his sides like a spooked animal. Everything’s too bright, too loud, chatter and laughter and an endless throbbing that may or may not be his own heart. A tongue scrapes across his back and he chokes. He can’t breathe. 

* * *

When he wakes, his entire body is agony. His head pounds, as do his knees and shoulders, his ass. Christ, what had he done last night. Gingerly, he opens his eyes, and is relieved to see that the room he’s in is dark, quiet. There’s a large glass of water and a bottle of pills on the table next to him. Slowly turning his torso, Jack grabs the glass and takes a sip. The water is salty and a little sweet, and he wrinkles his nose but drinks anyway. He probably needs whatever’s in it. The bottle turns out to be painkillers, and he throws two of them back with the rest of the water before lying down again.

When he next opens his eyes, Jesse is sitting on the bed next to him. He hasn’t seen the man in years. He blinks a few times in confusion, convinced he must be hallucinating, before reaching out and confirming that there’s definitely someone on the bed with him. “Jesse?” he asks, mildly horrified at how hoarse his voice sounds, “That you?”

“Hey Jack,” Jesse’s holding another glass of water and he reaches out to pass it to Jack, “How’re you doing this morning?”

Jack takes the glass, gingerly sitting and wincing as his lower back stabs pain up his spine. After he’s downed the water he tells Jesse, “Feel like I got run over by a truck. The fuck was I drinking last night, I don’t remember any of it.”

There’s a pause as Jesse looks at him, brows furrowed. He looks like he’s trying to make a decision. After a moment, he sighs and takes the empty glass from Jack’s hand. “I dunno, you turned up on my doorstep at three am and crashed in my bed. Back’s killing me from sleeping on the sofa.”

Jack apologises, for all the good it does, but Jesse waves it off. Jack clearly needed the bed more than he did, who was he to deny an old man his rest. Despite how his body still aches, Jack insists on getting up, on heading back to his own dingy apartment to lick his wounds. Walking is agony, but he’s always been a stubborn bastard. Jesse tries, halfheartedly, to get him to stay. To recover with someone to watch over him. He can’t look Jack in the eye.

It’s only when he’s standing on the train, more than halfway home, that Jack realises that he doesn’t actually know where Jesse lives.


End file.
